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A review by jdintr
All Our Names by Dinaw Mengestu
3.0
This book grew on me as I read, and I simply couldn't put it down once I had passed the halfway point.
Mengestu carefully unfolds the story of Isaac Mabira, balancing the backstory of a poor young man of Ethiopian origin who travels to the Ugandan capital of Kamapala with the story of an American social worker who falls in love with the African student she is charged to settle in at a midwestern American university.
The chapters unwind masterfully, drawing us into the mystery of Isaac Mabira, and whether that is indeed the name of the student who carries his passport and visa. At the same time, the reader is drawn into the birth of the nation of Uganda, and wars that took place over the leadership of that emerging republic in the late-1960s, the time in which the book is set.
I think that American readers will learn from the confusion that evolves with a nation like Uganda, which is split into realms of extreme wealth and poverty on the college campus, but which descends into civil war as other interests move in to get their share of the power in traditional, non-democratic ways. It happened for former British colonies, the same way it is currently happening following America's short occupation of Iraq.
Mengestu carefully unfolds the story of Isaac Mabira, balancing the backstory of a poor young man of Ethiopian origin who travels to the Ugandan capital of Kamapala with the story of an American social worker who falls in love with the African student she is charged to settle in at a midwestern American university.
The chapters unwind masterfully, drawing us into the mystery of Isaac Mabira, and whether that is indeed the name of the student who carries his passport and visa. At the same time, the reader is drawn into the birth of the nation of Uganda, and wars that took place over the leadership of that emerging republic in the late-1960s, the time in which the book is set.
I think that American readers will learn from the confusion that evolves with a nation like Uganda, which is split into realms of extreme wealth and poverty on the college campus, but which descends into civil war as other interests move in to get their share of the power in traditional, non-democratic ways. It happened for former British colonies, the same way it is currently happening following America's short occupation of Iraq.